The daily grind of travelling to and from work has a negative effect on the mental health of women, a study has found. Men, on the other hand, are generally unaffected, despite commuting taking up more of their time.

The reason could be that women have more responsibility for day-to-day household tasks, such as childcare and domestic chores, researchers believe. This could make them more sensitive to the pressures of commuting.

Co-author and economist Prof Jennifer Roberts, from the University of Sheffield, said: "We know that women, especially those with children, are more likely to add daily errands to their commute, such as food shopping and dropping off and picking up children from childcare.

"These time constraints and the reduced flexibility that comes with them make commuting stressful in a way that it wouldn't be otherwise."

The research, called It's driving her mad: Gender differences in the effects of commuting on psychological health, is published today in the Journal Of Health Economics, and found that women with pre-school age children were affected the most.

For them, the psychological impact of commuting was four times greater than it was for men with pre-school children.

The team studied data from the British Household Panel Survey, an annual poll of households across the UK that includes information about employment, social and economic factors, well-being and health.